Nortel Focuses Channel On The Enterprise Opportunity

Nortel Networks President and CEO Bill Owens recently sat down with a group of journalists, including Infrastructure Editor Jennifer Hagendorf Follett, to discuss the company's future in the wake of layoffs and a sweeping reorganization.

CRN: What's your assessment of Nortel's channel strategy at this point?

Owens: Nortel has, on the carrier side, these remarkable relationships around the world with most of the large telecom companies, so those are great channels to help with the marketing and sales of products that really matter to those large telecom companies. Now, many of them are interested in enterprise solutions as well because they have their own enterprise business. If you look at the world out there, you have to ask yourself, in the world of technology [is there any channel stronger than Nortel's] relationships that have been built over many decades of interface with these various carrier [partners]?

The channel strategies that are being built with enterprises--as you know there are thousands of enterprises, so it is more challenging for us to be able to go and exercise those channels. You have to build them yourself, you have to build the confidence and reliability in those networks. That is something that takes a long time, and we are doing extremely well with that. The enterprise business is good. We think that the services business is important there, too, to be able to offer [services to] enterprise networks because they are complex. They are, in a growing way, mandating five-nines reliability and security in their own networks, and here is an area where we have a great opportunity through channels that we've already developed to deliver these solutions to the enterprise.

CRN: Are you increasing your investment in the channel, particularly as you try to grow that enterprise business?

Owens: Yes, we are, and you'll find us putting more time and attention into the enterprise business and partners, and I think over the next year you'll see announcements relating to this.

CRN: What are [enterprise customers] asking you, what are they concerned about and how concerned are they about your reorganization?

Owens: In my experience with them, they are not particularly concerned, given that we are putting a lot of attention to enterprise and we are looking to bulk it up. We are looking for strategic ways to do that. We are maintaining our R&D expenditure in enterprise in a substantial way, and this is a very serious part of Nortel.